Stardust Review

Granted, I am a Neil Gaiman whore, and will love pretty much everything this guy touches, but that doesn't mean that Stardust isn't goddamn amazing.

Let me elaborate:

My dad is a nerd, and introduced me to nerdery at a very young age. As such, The Princess Bride has been one of my favorite books and movies since I was about 4. There are not many things that I loved at 4 that I still adore now, so I hope you can understand my affection for this story.

I would recommend Stardust to anyone who liked The Princess Bride. I wouldn't say Stardust is superior, but it's pretty much the only film I've seen that's even in the same class as Princess Bride. It's got that same tongue-in-cheek approach to fantasy, and it's just marvelously fun. The film is helmed by Matthew Vaughn, of Layer Cake notoriety and based on the novel by Gaiman. Well, loosely based. Based in so much as a lot of the characters have the same names, and the overarching plot remains the same. The deviations are all pretty much for the best, though; they just work much better than the book versions might have (e.g. I have no idea how you'd pronounce "Tristran" and sound natural).

In this respect (and a few others) the relationship reminds me of Howl's Moving Castle. Not only because the Stardust novel sounds uncannily like Diana Wynne Jones (I was not surprised at all to see her mentioned in the acknowledgments), but because the films play up different themes and take the story in different directions.

So if the Stardust novel didn't strike you, go see the movie. And if you loved the novel, go see the movie. And if you haven't read it, go see the movie. (You see where I'm going with this, right?)

The movie undoubtedly has some weaknesses: there's some cheap humor, a bit of cheese, and a total lack of Cary Elwes. But it's got a lot of strong points: BEAUTIFUL costumes (particularly on the men), a really sweet love story, a so-cheesy-it's-awesome end credits song, and probably the best sword fight since Inigo vs. The Man in Black.